The following class changes are going live on the PTR and I’m reposting them here for visibility.
Holy priest LMAOO
9 Likes
Yep…holy priest is always ignored/forgotten until it’s half way through a patch and they realize how behind we are compared to the other healers. We can never just be good at the start of a patch. It’s so disappointing!
4 Likes
Yep, I’m just quitting. Holy is at it’s most bland and underwhelming gameplay it’s ever been at. I miss when PoM actually felt good to press even without the 2 charges.
4 Likes
The penance change is stupid. Who was having this problem? Literally who?
I’m a little worried about the number changes here, but like the spirit of the disc changes. I’m very annoyed that shadowmend is getting what is effectively a nerf to make it more reliable.
1 Like
If they wanted to make hymn easier to cast/use, let us move while we’re channeling it or remove the channel completely. We’re holy priests, we’re not suppose to lose all faith but I’m am. We’re just completely ignored patch after patch.
2 Likes
The hilarious part (as in, you laugh when you’d otherwise cry) is if what it initially says was how it actually worked, the Divine Hymn change would be amazingly awesome and overpowered. “Divine Hymn has been updated – Now additionally grants Guardian Spirit while channeled.”
So, you know, if everyone you channeled on got guardian spirit - yay cheat death for everyone?
I had one second of amazed hope (and frank disbelief) before the developers notes explained that it did not actually do what the first line said.
edit: updating my post since I got a chance to try it out on PTR and see how it actually works.
good news: it does give you guardian spirit for five seconds without you having to actually use the cooldown, so better than I feared. it will also give you guardian spirit even if it is already on cooldown.
other good news: if the cheat death triggers during hymn, it does NOT increase the cooldown to three minutes on your castable guardian spirit if you have guardian angel talent.
the annoying news: (it still looses a bit compared to what druids got, which is a 60% hp shield and an immunity to knockbacks)
overall: quality of life improvement, definite win. but I still have some druid envy.
3 Likes
Great, a nerf to resonant energy, stacking up to 4 instead of 5 times, a nothing change to divine hymn..and an extremely poor tier set. Great start. I’m so motivated to play, its wonderful seeing every other class and spec get talent tree reworks, paragraphs of changes and meaningful gameplay changes while holy priest is screwed over after suffering through season 1 as one of the least represented weakest healers…why don’t they just remove the spec from the game instead as it seems thats the design intent
2 Likes
I will say one positive thing. They are increasing HP by 25% and damage taken by 25%. As a healer I do A LOT of overhealing. If they don’t adjust other healers’ output upwards than having more to heal will bring me further ahead than other classes.
I’m still sour about the class changes they made at the start of the expansion but if there’s something for me to actually heal I can be a very effective healer on the meters.
another promise to reduce “Spiky damage” the same exact thing they try to do over and over and fail to do over and over
i am reserving my opinion on if this will be a net positive
3 Likes
The way I read that is that it will grant us GS while we’re channeling Divine Hymn. I don’t know what the raid mechanics are going to look like but it seems like it might be a viable workaround for not moving while channeling Divine Hymn. Not only will we heal ourselves 60% more with the Hymn but we can essentially eat a mechanic that would otherwise kill us while channeling (the Saladbar spinny mechanic from the current raid comes to mind). The second bullet point seems to explain what happens if we had already hard casted GS on ourselves prior to channeling Divine Hymn. That’s the way I read that anyway.
I like it thematically. I tend to stand in stuff a lot. This would let me do that more. It makes me feel good to not have to obey mechanics and not face reprocussions for planting my feet and pumping out healing.
2 Likes
You’re right and it is a definite buff.
Having got to test it this morning I appreciate the change.
I was all set to be like: “yay, an actual unalloyed QoL buff” …then I saw that druids are getting a 60% shield and also getting knockback protection during tranq and immediate envy struck. 
(yes, yes, “comparison is the thief of joy” but also: can we kidnap the resto druid dev? I promise to treat them well)
1 Like
so there are still opportunities to keep nerfing Disc
The fact that Shadow priests are basically all gone and are not really saying anything should be a good indicator of how people feel. (They all left to play other games).
But Shadow is underwhelming, saw not attention for the majority of S1 and is now, similar to holy, being largely ignored. Nothing to address Survival, mobility, utility for the priest class.
Though it hasn’t been posted the tier sets are also really bad for Shadow. I can’t speak for the healers but for shadow… these are very bad. The notable good thing is 3s reduced cd on Tentacle slam. Giving it 100% increased damage is pointless because its damage is pathetic. The 4 piece is useless in single target after the first cast and makes M+ a chaotic nightmare in terms of target priority.
In an expansion where classes were supposed to be simplified and more approachable shadow priest high-end M+ is a chaotic nightmare of managing dots on dozens of mobs and addons to help with this have been gutted by blizz. The developers are sadistic towards priests this expansion.
Priest
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Discipline
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2-Set Bonus: Penance damage and healing increased by 20%. Casting Penance reduces the cooldown of Mind Blast by 2 seconds.
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4-Set Bonus: After casting Mind Blast, your next Power Word: Shield or Void Shield absorbs 25% more damage.
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Holy
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2-Set Bonus: Each target affected by your Renew increases your Haste by 2%, up to 6%.
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4-Set Bonus: Renew healing increased by 10%. Light’s Resurgence now has a 100% chance to leave a Renew on the first target Prayer of Mending heals.
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Shadow
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Developers’ notes: The Shadow Priest set will be available PTR week 2.
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2-Set Bonus: Tentacle Slam cooldown reduced by 3 seconds and its damage is increased by 100%.
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4-Set Bonus: After casting Tentacle Slam, your next Vampiric Touch is instant, generates 4 additional Insanity, and conjures Shadowy Apparitions that deal 200% of normal damage.
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1 Like
The only positive part with the notes is the comment that says that the set will be available week 2. Since its the only spec that has that comment.
Maybe more is coming? Probably not, I just cant understand how Blizzard manage to pinpoint two issues. But instead of actually fixing them they make them a little less of an issue instead.
Shadow changes are good, just maybe a bit tame. Tier set is awful, both in power level and gameplay.
1 Like
Did they really change anything gameplay wise?
I just dont see how Shadow will play any different, besides spewing more Void Volleys during Voidform.
Archon might spend the entirety of Void Form casting VV’s, with Focused Outburst and the VV charges, as it also synergizes well with Mind’s Eye SW:M cost reduction. I didn’t see it number wise how that performs, though, but the idea of almost spamming Volley during VF sounds good.